Friday, March 27, 2009

We’re in the middle of reading Junie B. Jones: Toothless Wonder. It’s a funny story. Darren thinks it’s funny because Junie B. yells a lot and says things that aren’t true. Sometimes she says words wrong, like “flutterflies” instead of butterflies! She also told her mother that the tooth fairy is really a tooth witch! Junie B. is hilarious!

During Reader’s Workshop, Michael got to read all of the books in his book bag. Some children are reading with Ms. Stern to get better at reading and move to a higher level. Kaitlyn moved to a new level, where she is going to concentrate on reading smoothly. Everyone is supposed to be thinking about characters and the traits that they show while they are reading.

We shared a few Flat Stanleys today.

• We learned about Sean’s travels to New Jersey to visit his aunt. He spent time “chilling out.” He also watched the Superbowl, went to school with his cousin, went to work at a bank with his aunt, and he also went to see the Pink Panther 2.
• Daniel went to Canada to see his mom’s old babysitter. The island that Daniel went to doesn’t have many people who live there. You have to take lots of ferries to get from place to place. There are only 80 students at one school and 50 at another. We have more people in first grade than they do in all of their grades there! There are oyster and fish farms in the Pacific Northwest.
• Sophia went to Florida to visit her cousins. The real Sophia went to visit her cousins and brought in a bunch of artifacts from the sea. We got to examine a horseshoe crab, conch egg pouches, sand dollar, fossilized conch, and a sea urchin.
  
  At P.E. we played a game called “Surprise.” We got into groups and got to name our teams. Nolan, Sammy, Joshua, Anthony, and Gianluca were called the Thunderbolts. They passed the ball around in a pattern. After one ball is being used, a second ball is added. When the coach calls “SURPRISE,” the teammates have to line up behind the person holding the ball. Nolan thought it started off easy and then got trickier.
  
  Today we got a chance to look through our Mem writing, read it all, and choose a piece to make sure we included a strong beginning. We learned that writing a good beginning is a challenge, even for Mem. Our goal is to “hook” our readers and get them to want to read more. Anthony found that most of his stories had a strong beginning. Sophia thought most of hers did, too.
  
  We had a contest in the class. Mrs. Piteo gave us our class decorations from the Dance Festival. Ms. Stern asked us to pick a number 1-20 to see who would get to keep them. Isabella guessed correct first and Sophia guessed the number the second time. Isabella wants to hang hers on her dresser in her bedroom.
  
  We’ve done a lot of discovering about our mealworms this week. We now believe that the mealworms turn into the pupae and the pupae become beetles! Yesterday we looked closely at how they change over time. We noticed that the features become darker and the body gets more round. The eyes are the first parts that we can see. Next week we will learn more about the mealworms and how they change.

Animal Encounters Challenge!

Today we got to see (and touch!) a variety of reptiles from the Animal Encounters program. The animals that we saw were:

• blue tongued skink

• milk snake


• box turtle



• snapping turtle

• alligator


• albino boa constrictor


• legless lizard
  

Choose one (or more) of the animals to research. See if you can find information about its habitat (where it lives), diet (what it eats), and 2 other interesting NEW facts about that animal. Record your responses in the comment section at the bottom of this post. Use your first name or initials only. I can't wait to see what you learn!

Monday, March 23, 2009

This morning we had our weekly 100 facts. Joshua graduated to subtraction and Sean is moving on to subtraction 5 minutes! Afterwards, we played a game of Pig. Ms. Stern won! Next, we got to make groups of 2, 3, or 4 to play with each other.

Ms. Eyer came in and talked to us about simple machines. We figured out what they were by thinking about the words “simple” and “machine” and began exploring where we might find them in our lives. Simple is another is word for easy or basic and a machine is something that helps us do something faster and easier. Darren learned screws come in different sizes and some screws are used to lift objects. Sophia learned that there are machines called pulleys. Isabella learned that an ax is another simple machine. Rebecca discovered that there are 7 different kinds of simple machines. Ms. Eyer asked us to think about simple machines and when and how we use them in our lives. The next time she comes back, we will be put to the challenge in using them!
During P.E. we played Pin Guard. You need two teams. Seven people guard a pin. Everyone else is trying to knock down the other team’s pin with a ball. While that’s happening, the guards are trying to protect their own team’s pin. At the same time, the teams are trying to score baskets. Our class beat Mrs. Yelin’s class by 4 points. Sean got 2 hoops (worth 10 points each) that helped our class with our victory.

We had some really good noticings about the mealworms! Last week, Ms. Stern took out the mystery “things” that we originally thought were either dead or babies. Ms. Stern had removed them all from the mealworm container. Today, we counted 18 new ones in the very same container. That got us thinking…Bartosz, Mia, and lots of other children think that changed from the mealworms. That makes sense because Ms. Stern didn’t add them so that means that whatever was inside must have changed somehow. We also noticed that the container with the “things” from last week had something new. It was a bug! We started doing some really difficult scientific thinking and asked some terrific questions, all to be recorded in our mealworm journals tomorrow!

Thursday, March 19, 2009

This morning we reviewed long e words. It was sort of like a spelling test. We had 3 tries to get the correct spelling of 10 different words. Bartosz thought it was challenging because some of the words, like “reach” were words we haven’t had before. After we tried to write the 10 words, there were 2 sentence dictations. Lots of children think they got the sentences right!

We learned a math game called Pig. You play by rolling 2 dice. You add the numbers together and write it down. If you get 1 one, you lose your turn. If you roll 2 ones, you lose all of your points! Each player can have as many turns as they want until they roll a 1. We played on the Smartboard: Ms. Stern vs. the class. Ms. Stern was winning…but then she rolled 2 ones! In the end, the class won!

We observed the mealworms again this morning. There was something different about some of the mealworms. Some people thought they were dead. Others thought they had shed their skin. Some children thought they were babies! Nolan noticed that they looked smaller, lighter, and bumpier than the rest. Axl thought they were more round. Emily thought they were dead at first, but then she looked closely and saw the tail was moving. Joshua held 3 mealworms in his hand. One was lighter than the others. After we had time to observe, everyone recorded their thinking in their mealworm journals.

During indoor recess, lots of kids wanted to play the space math game. http://www.learningplanet.com/sam/sm/index.asp We are getting much better with our adding and subtracting!

In music, we read a book called I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly. Then we sang the song. After that, we watched the movie of it. Finally, we did 3 dances.

We got to continue working on any of our Mem Fox writing pieces. Some people finished their writing. Many people chose to continue working on their dream/imagination pieces. Mia chose that piece because she liked having the chance to write about her favorite dream and she wanted it to come true in her writing. Sammy wanted to write about something very funny in his dream. Zoe chose to continue working on her Zoo Looking pattern book. At the end, we shared Kaitlyn, Sean, and Kevin’s writing.











Tonight is the Dance Festival! Wear comfortable clothes and bring sunglasses. See you at 7:00 at the high school!

From Ms. Stern:
For those of you that are familiar with it, I've recently started a Twitter account. You can follow us with occasional updates here: http://twitter.com/Room66 It is also linked to our blog. Updates can be found on the right hand side, just beneath my photo.

St. Patrick's Day-Tuesday, March 17, 2009

This morning we discovered that the Smartboard turned green! We don’t know who did it. Ms. Stern wasn’t in the room when the kids came in so we don’t think she did it. Anthony thinks the leprechauns did it. Lots of kids saw footprints on the walls in the hallway. They were little. We even saw a pair on the Flat Stanley bulletin board! Around snack time, Kaitlyn and some others discovered green glitter on the floor by the door. It appeared all around the room as the morning went on! We were all in the room and nobody saw anything or anyone appear! It’s a mystery!

We wrote about wishes that we had. While we brainstormed our ideas we heard bagpipe music coming from the hallway. Everyone quickly lined up to see the man pass by. He was wearing a skirt. We found out that it is called a kilt. The music sounded really cool. Once he passed by, we got back to work. Bartosz’s wish was that he could have a mud bike and ride it all day. Sean wished for 100 girlfriends because they are cute. Michael wished for $100 because he could be rich. Carly wished that she would have a real life kitten because she hasn’t had one since she was three.

During Reader’s Workshop we read Miss Nelson is Missing. We discussed the character traits that Miss Viola Swamp demonstrated. We came up with the words strict, mean, tough, and tricky and found evidence in the book to prove that she acted that way. Next, we went to our seats to practice reading and thinking about the characters in our books. We marked pages and wrote character traits as we read.

In art, we drew flowers with pencils because we’re learning about still lifes. A still life is something that you look at and draw what you see. The object stays still. Carly worked on coloring her still life with oil pastels. We learned how to blend the colors to make new ones. For example, adding white on top of the red will make pink.

In Writer’s Workshop we continued to practice showing instead of telling. Yesterday we acted out different emotions. We had to think of a feeling, remembered a time we felt that way, and acted out that memory for the class. Darren was nervous. He was acting out how he felt at the Dance Festival. Mia acted out being disappointed when our trip to Philipsburg Manor got canceled. It was hard finding the words that matched our actions (ex. clasped my hands together tightly while swinging back and forth; or jumped up and down, waving my hands in the air) and remembering the words that were being said during these moments. Today we started new stories, trying to remember to SHOW, not tell.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

This morning we practiced the poem, The Field Trip. We tried reading it in rounds (2 groups) like an echo. It sounded cool. After we put our new poem in our poetry journals, we saw a video about 2 vowels together. We got to sing along after watching it a few times! The second vowel does the walking and the first one does the talking.

In math, we talked about the difference between addition and subtraction. Adding is when we combine and subtraction is when we take away. Nolan remembered that in addition the answer is called the sum and in subtraction it is called the difference. Today we learned how to subtract using pictures or symbols. A bunch of us made a common mistake: adding instead of subtracting! We are all going to look really carefully to see if there is a plus sign (which tells us to add) or a minus sign (which tells us to take away).

During Reader’s Workshop we had to infer about characters. We read Strega Nona’s Magic Lessons and compared the traits we came up with yesterday (after reading Strega Nona) about the two main characters. The traits we came up with yesterday (fair and helpful) were true of her character today, just as Big Anthony’s traits (foolish, sneaky, jealous) were as well.

At music, we kept the beat and played instruments to the My Many Colored Day by Dr. Seuss. We also danced the Cha Cha Slide and the Macarena to get ready for the dance festival.

After specials we went to technology. We made stories on the computer. The box on the top was to create the picture. There were tools like a spray can, a pencil, eraser, shapes, stamps, and backgrounds. On the bottom, we started writing a story to match the picture. Darren wrote about space aliens. Kaitlyn wrote about living in Circle World. Gianluca also wrote about aliens. Axl wrote about 2 rockets about to get launched into space. We switched our Technology time so we didn’t get to Writer’s Workshop. That means that anyone who didn’t send in their artifact today still has 1 more day to bring it in. Please make sure to send in one artifact for tomorrow!

Yesterday, Mia’s tooth finally came out! Ms. Stern also got a visit from 2 of her former students from her first class of first graders. They are 12 and 13. We also observed the mealworms and recorded our observations and questions in our journals. There was lots of great thinking taking place!

Thursday, March 5, 2009

In math, we learned to use a number line. Gianluca remembers that we ALWAYS start with the bigger number (even when we’re not using a number line)! The class practiced on the Smartboard using the fancy markers. After that, everyone went off to practice by themselves. A few children stayed on the rug if they felt like they needed some help.

During Reader’s Workshop we read a story called Where are You Going Manyoni? We learned that readers infer what the author does not tell. Together, we inferred what words like baobab, mopani, Limpopo, and bushpig are using the pictures, rereading, our schema, and a lot of thinking!

In art, we worked on scratch art. We used a wooden tool to make scratches on special paper. It shows a rainbow underneath! Kevin and the other children made a checker board. Kaitlyn thought it looked really cool. We also did optical illusion art. It’s also called Op Art. We started off making a vase. The vase could also look like two faces looking at each other.

We continued our Mem Fox study by reading Whoever You Are. Mem taught us that readers write for an audience and also that books have a message. This one was to show us that people all around the world are different on the outside but the same on the inside. We made a list of traits and virtues that are important to use and to the world.

Today we had our first day of mealworm observations. We could pick them up and touch them. Sophia didn’t want to touch them because she just doesn’t like stuff like that. Michael picked up a whole bunch and held them in his hands. They felt dry. Zoe thought the top felt smooth. One mealworm curled up on Darren’s finger. Daniel is wondering why they were eating popcorn. Some other children are thinking that they are eating vitamins or oats.

Mia has a crooked super duper loose tooth that doesn’t seem to want to come out! Ms. Stern is really looking forward to it coming out!!!!!!!